Elia Cmiral (Ilja David Cmíral)

Biography

Czechoslovakia

Elia Cmiral (pronounced smear-al)'s first break came when his father let him score "Cyrano de Bergerac" at his theater when he was just eighteen years old. But before he could build a career in Czechoslovakia, he escaped to Sweden and, to his surprise, was soon asked to score a full-length battle for the National Theater entitled "Nemesis." Deciding to study film scoring in the United States, he moved to Los Angeles in 1987 and enrolled at USC. Through some friends, he had the opportunity to score the cult film "Apartment Zero. Read more..."his own record, and he moved back. Four years later, in the winter of 1993, Elia moved back to Los Angeles and resumed his scoring career. In 1996, Don Johnson hired him to score the first season episodes and theme for his new series, "Nash Bridges, " on CBS. Elia also scored "Somebody Is Waiting, " with the same director from "Apartment Zero, " but it didn't get any US distribution. His big break came when Michael Sandovall, of MGM/United Artists, gave Elia the opportunity to audition for John Frankenheimer's "Ronin." The score was released on Varese Sarabande to rave reviews, and Elia signed to be represented by "The Gorfaine/Schwartz Agency, " the largest film scoring agency in the world.